


It's the Life You Love to Live

by brynnmck



Category: due South
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-11
Updated: 2007-03-11
Packaged: 2017-12-14 18:03:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/839782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brynnmck/pseuds/brynnmck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Ray shifted in the driver's seat, trying to move his weight to his right ass-cheek so his left one could get a break. </i>Ah, the Dance of the Five-Hour Stakeout, <i>he thought ruefully.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	It's the Life You Love to Live

**Author's Note:**

> Mentions of Fraser/Janet Morse; vague spoilers through "Call of the Wild." Thanks to [](http://sdwolfpup.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://sdwolfpup.livejournal.com/)**sdwolfpup** for the beta and enthusiasm! :) And for the prompt in the first place.

"This is stupid," said Kowalski for about the tenth time in as many minutes.

Ray groaned. "Geez, Kowalski, give it a rest, will ya?" He shifted in the driver's seat, trying to move his weight to his right ass-cheek so his left one could get a break. _Ah, the Dance of the Five-Hour Stakeout_ , he thought ruefully. Not that he would ever suggest that the 1971 Buick Riviera that he'd finally managed to track down and restore wasn't an eminently luxurious vehicle, but after five hours, he was pretty sure angels would be complaining about how uncomfortable clouds were.

"I'll give _you_ a rest," Kowalski was muttering, his face twisted into a scowl and two long fingers rubbing at the upholstery of the seat beneath him.

"Hey!" Ray objected. "Hands off, _Stanley_ , you're gonna put a hole in it!"

Kowalski looked up at that, his eyes wicked in the dim light and his pout sliding lightning-fast into a leer. "Well, gee, Vecchio, that ain't what you said last night."

And suddenly various areas of Ray's body that he had feared had been rendered permanently numb from sitting started to perk up and take notice, and he had to turn his face to the window to hide the hint of a smile. "We're here to work, you pervert, not make out in my car like a couple of horny teenagers."

"Yeah, I know," Kowalski sighed. Then he grinned, the reflection of it wide and white in the window. "Too bad, huh?"

Ray turned back to him then, let Kowalski have it with the full force of his answering grin. Cocky little bastard, and Ray did _not_ find that attractive, dammit. "Yeah, can't argue with that." He ran his tongue along his bottom lip—a trick he'd learned from Fraser—and stretched lazily, ending with a casual arm across the back of the passenger seat. "And since you finally quit your bitching and agreed that mine is the superior stakeout vehicle, we've even got that nice big back seat there going to waste."

Kowalski's eyes glazed a little, and this time he was the one to turn away. "You're an asshole, Vecchio." Ray could hear the smile in his voice, and the fact that it was a bit on the strained side made it even better. He reached forward and slid his fingers briefly through the tousled blond hair on the back of Kowalski's head.

"I know. I'll make it up to you later," he promised.

"Yeah, well, you better." A pause, then, "Asshole."

Ray laughed.

"Besides," Kowalski went on, "the only reason I agreed to take the Riv is that your cars got a habit of blowing up, so I figure, y'know, better yours than mine."

"Oh, yeah, you're a laugh riot," Ray said, trying to muster up a glare in the face of Kowalski's smirk. "You're just lucky I don’t wanna get blood on my upholstery."

"Ooh, I'm terrified," Kowalski sneered, and ducked away from Ray's halfhearted swipe.

"Anyway," Ray pointed out, "I went years without getting my car blown up before I met Fraser, and he's a couple of thousand miles away right now, so you do the math, smart guy." Kowalski just rolled his eyes and nodded, and Ray was a little relieved, like he always was--there'd been a time, during the months-long pissing match that had highlighted Ray's return from Florida and Kowalski's from Canada, when Fraser had been a forbidden subject, just another bone of contention between them; Kowalski had been possessive and Ray had been protective and they'd growled and snarled and circled around it until one day they'd just agreed that they both loved him and he loved them and that all those concepts and combinations weren't mutually exclusive. If by "agreed" you meant "beat the crap out of each other in front of a bar and then had to listen to Frannie lecture them both in a blistering mixture of English and Italian while she patched them up, and _then_ reluctantly muttered something about a truce," but hey, effective communication was the key to a healthy relationship.

"So what do you think he's doing right now? Fraser, I mean," Kowalski asked after a few minutes, slouching down deeper in his seat. Ray swore to God the guy was gonna end up the Hunchback of the 27th Precinct one of these days, as crappy as his posture was, though Kowalski's flexibility definitely had other advantages and _dammit_ , he really wished the Giordanos would show so he and Kowalski could get the hell out of there and screw each other's brains out like civilized people, preferably on the new Egyptian cotton sheets that he'd brought home the day before. Sheets which Kowalski had totally failed to appreciate ("A hundred bucks for _sheets_? Do they, like, make you breakfast or something, or, I dunno, wash your car? Call your mom once a week, maybe?"), and Ray was looking forward to making him eat his words—at the very least—on that one.

"Hey," Kowalski said, his voice thick and lazy. "Earth to Vecchio. Take us to your leader."

"Huh?" Ray rubbed his eyes; two in the morning didn't do much for his focus these days. "Sorry. Fraser, right." He yawned. "Sleeping, probably, the lucky bum."

Kowalski snickered. "Yeah. What the hell is that about, anyway? How come he's all snuggled up with the hot bounty hunter—"

"And I'm stuck in this alley with a skinny Polack," Ray finished, and Kowalski was right there with him, only he substituted "balding Italian" for "skinny Polack," and that was a well-worn dance by now, just like Kowalski's hand sliding warm over Ray's thigh, hooking their pinkies together loosely.

"Man, that chick _owns_ his ass," Kowalski went on, sounding delighted, and Ray chuckled.

"She does, indeed." After years of dealing with Fraser's infuriating infallible Mountie-ness, he and Kowalski both took a perverse pleasure in watching their friend stumble and gape when he got near Janet, walking around half the time with a stupid grin on his face like he'd just won a million caribou, or whatever the hell the Canadian lottery paid out in. Revenge was a dish best served by seeing your best friend get knocked spurs over Stetson by a woman who deserved him, apparently.

Ray was enjoying that mental image enough that it took him a couple of seconds to notice that Kowalski's hand was moving on his leg, drifting slowly in a direction that Ray's body was really, really excited about.

"Kowalski!" he growled, catching the slender fingers and tangling them with his, safely out of range. "I'm serious. Hands off."

"But I'm _bored_ ," Kowalski complained.

Ray raised an eyebrow. "Aw, stop it, you sweet talker, you're making me blush."

"Don't be so bitchy, Vecchio," Kowalski drawled, sliding toward him now with hot, hooded eyes, nuzzling underneath Ray's ear. "I'm a pretty hot ticket, y'know, and you get me all to yourself…"

Ray laughed, but it was breathless, Kowalski's mouth warm and wet on his neck. "Kowalski," he repeated, more of a moan now, his eyes drifting shut against his will as his partner bit gently at his jawline.

"Hey, hey, hey," Kowalski murmured, "eyes front, Detective, we got bad guys to catch."

Ray forced his eyes open. "Asshole."

"Yeah, maybe later," Kowalski said, low and obscene with his hand sliding under Ray's shirt, cold fingers against warm skin. Ray laughed again, and this was unbelievably, record-breakingly stupid but it was two in the morning and yeah, he'd had his fucking buttermilk in Vegas but no one had come near him, no one had touched the Bookman but strippers and sycophants and something just _sparked_ when Kowalski got in his space, all hands and heat and heart, and once he'd finally given in he'd had a hell of a time finding any resistance ever since.

Not that he would ever admit it, of course.

Kowalski was whispering to him now, "Wanna taste you, Vecchio, wanna make you shake, wanna feel you in me, God, you feel so good," and it just kept getting dirtier from there, a steady, relentless pornographic monologue in his ear—Kowalski had the filthiest fucking mouth of anyone Ray had ever met, and his hands were smooth and sure and the windows were fogging up and Ray was melting into the seat and—

And through his half-closed eyelids, he caught a flash of light reflecting off metal near the warehouse. He sat up, tension snapping his muscles tight. "Kowalski—"

"Got it," Kowalski said instantly, pulling away from him. He reached for the door handle with one hand and unsnapped his gun from its holster with the other, but then he hesitated, shook his head like it needed clearing, and Ray caught the flash of his grin as he popped the door open, felt his own grin curving his lips while he grabbed the radio to call for backup.

Kowalski, of course, didn't give a crap about backup, and by the time Ray caught up with him, he was pressed up against the wall of the warehouse next to the door and their two suspects had disappeared inside. Kowalski made some elaborate hand motion that translated to, "Hey, let's kick the door down," which Ray could decipher primarily because that was pretty much _always_ Kowalski's Plan A, and in this case that worked for him, so he just shrugged and nodded and _bam_ , they each planted a foot in the center of the door and the latch gave way with a snap.

Four guys inside that Ray could see— _Nicky, Franco, Paulie, Nunzio,_ his mind supplied helpfully—all of them lowlife goombahs and all of them startled and fumbling for weapons as he and Kowalski strode in guns-first.

"Freeze, Chicago PD!" he shouted, and then tried not to do a double-take when Kowalski added,

"Grab some sky, shit-sticks!"

The Giordanos' expressions shifted from shock to utter confusion at that, and Ray struggled to keep a straight face. He was continually surprised at how much "worst case of Attention Deficit Disorder in recorded history" looked, to the casual observer, like "might bite your nose off if you looked at him funny," and while the Giordanos were trying to figure out which side Kowalski fell on, Ray took the opportunity to fire a warning shot just over their heads.

Which worked great in that all four of them immediately hit the deck, and Ray grinned smugly, but his moment of triumph was somewhat tarnished by the stripe of bullets that skipped off the concrete about four feet to his left.

"Shit!" he hissed, diving for the cover of a nearby crate, crouching with Kowalski's shoulder pressed against his and both of them breathing hard. The shooter was on a walkway high up the wall in the shadows, so dark Ray had missed it at first; hard to miss it at this point, what with the automatic weapons, but now they were pinned down, and the other four guys were off the floor and scrambling for better positions.

"I think you pissed 'em off," Kowalski panted next to him, his fingers tight on his gun and a devil light in his eyes.

"'Shit-sticks'? Seriously? Who says that?" was all Ray had time for, and then it was nothing but duck, breathe, fire, duck, wince, breathe, fire, until the door banged open again and Ray heard the sweet music of several of Chicago's finest coming to their rescue.

"Hey, backup, good call," Kowalski said approvingly while the room filled with blue uniforms, giving Ray's knee a couple of quick pats and then using it as a brace to lever himself to his feet.

Ray sighed, shook his head, and stood, brushing dust off his clothes. Dammit, he'd just had this coat cleaned. A few yards away, Kowalski was yanking Nicky Giordano away from Huey's grasp. "Thanks for keepin' him warm for me, Jack."

Huey rolled his eyes, but backed off. "I don't want your two-bit bust, Kowalski, and you're welcome, by the way, for saving your sorry ass."

"Yeah, yeah, you're my hero," Kowalski shrugged. "How's it goin', Nicky?" he asked cheerfully, snapping the handcuffs on. "Just not your night, is it?" Then, "Hey, Vecchio, why don't you give him the box score," he called with a sharp grin, and Ray was pretty sure that somewhere in Kowalski's spastic brain, somewhere to the left of how to jimmy the candy machine at the precinct and underneath the ongoing version of _Bullitt_ that he seemed to think he was starring in, he did actually know the Miranda Warning, but Ray didn't mind filling in the blanks, so he just clamped one hand over the chain on the handcuffs, his fingers brushing Kowalski's as they made the switch.

"You have the right to remain silent, you disgrace to fine Italian heritage, and anything that comes out of your big, ugly mouth can and will be used against you in a court of law…"

Just over his shoulder, he could hear Kowalski chuckling.

An hour later, the scene was clear, the suspects were in custody, and Ray and Kowalski had been instructed to go home and get a few hours' sleep before they got started on their reports. Ray found himself stumbling through the dark alley next to the warehouse, punchy with lack of sleep and the last dregs of adrenaline, contemplating the prospect of his new 800-thread-count sheets with a degree of ecstatic fervor that would've made his ma slap him for blasphemy, when Kowalski turned suddenly, shoved him up against the brick warehouse wall and attacked Ray's mouth with his.

The adrenaline surged back through him like a tidal wave, sharp-edged now with lust, and Ray slid his hands along Kowalski's face, felt stubble and smelled stale coffee and heard Kowalski's happy, hungry groan against his mouth. He was tired enough for the whole thing to feel like a dream, a crazy warm wet dream with Kowalski's tongue sliding hot and eager against his and the muscles of Kowalski's back smooth and straining as Ray pushed his ratty t-shirt out of the way so he could get to skin. Ray didn't know how long they stayed like that, just kissing, their ragged breath loud in the small space between them, until Kowalski pulled back, letting one hand slide down over Ray's thundering heart.

"Hi," Kowalski said, his smile spit-slick and sweet around the edges.

Ray smiled back. "Hi."

Kowalski's eyes were glittering in the dimness. "Pretty good moves back there, Vecchio. You got two of 'em before the babysitters got there."

"Hey, wait, was that a compliment?" Ray let his mouth drop open. "You're not gettin' soft on me, are you, Kowalski?"

By way of answer, Kowalski grabbed one of Ray's hands and proved that he was, in fact, the exact opposite of soft, at least in a very key location.

"Nice," Ray rolled his eyes, but it was, actually, and he pressed harder and slow and watched Kowalski's eyelids flutter shut. He leaned forward, licked where he could see Kowalski's pulse pounding in his throat, and Kowalski laughed shakily and slipped out of his grasp.

"Uh-uh, no way. You promised me braciole and beer after this."

"Hey," Ray protested as Kowalski kept backing off, "who couldn't keep whose hands off whom, here?"

"Besides, I know you, Vecchio," Kowalski called over his shoulder. "It's been a long night and you're gonna want wine and candles and Trojan cotton sheets."

Ray grinned and started after him, though he did have to adjust himself in his slacks a little before he did. "Egyptian cotton, you Philistine."

"Whatever."

Kowalski was half-jogging, half-shadow-boxing now, apparently still with energy to burn even after everything, and Ray was looking forward to helping him do just that. By the time Ray got to the Riv, Kowalski was waiting for him, slouched against the car. "Took you long enough."

And it was like a light had suddenly clicked on somewhere, throwing everything into high relief: Vegas and Florida and his pop and his crazy family and his crazy Mountie best friend and his job and right there in front of him, his car and his partner and his city, with a faint few stars above them. "Yeah. Yeah, it did," he murmured, and kissed Kowalski hard.

Kowalski looked a little dazed when Ray pulled away, but not enough that he couldn't muster a wicked grin. "Want I should drive? Show the old girl a good time?"

"In your dreams, Kowalski," Ray grinned back, dragging his fingers through his partner's elaborately messy hair, and Kowalski laughed as he shadow-boxed his way around the car.


End file.
